Flexing Our Options

Employees today â€” many of whom are caught between
competing demands from both their young children and aging parents
â€” require more than just a steady paycheck from their jobs.
They need flexibility. According to an annual survey by the Society
for Human Resource Management (SHRM), which has tracked
employer-provided benefits since 1997, they're finally starting to
get it.

The survey â€” which polls over 700 human resources
professionals across the country about the kinds of perks companies
offer â€” reveals that businesses have shifted from providing
designated benefits, such as sick leave and vacation leave, to more
flexible offerings in areas such as spending accounts and
scheduling.

Almost twice as many companies today offer employees the option
to telecommute â€” or work someplace other than the office
â€” than just five years ago (37 percent compared with 20
percent). A quarter provide job-sharing opportunities, and 31
percent offer a compressed workweek, compared with 21 percent and
22 percent, respectively, that did so in 1997.

â€œFamily-friendlyâ€? benefits are especially in demand.
One of the most prevalent incarnations is the dependent flexible
spending account, which provides dependents with their own flex
spending options, offered by 69 percent of firms, up 7 points from
just a year ago. Flextime â€” which gives employees options
beyond the standard 9-to-5 office drill â€” is another popular
benefit, provided by 58 percent of firms, up from 51 percent in
2000. In addition, slightly more than one-quarter of companies (26
percent) are now providing paid family leave beyond the Family and
Medical Leave Act (FMLA) minimum requirement.

More firms are offering specific child-oriented benefits. Twenty
percent provide child-care referral services; 24 percent allow
parents to bring children to work in emergency situations; and 13
percent offer emergency/sick child-care. Companies today are also
more likely to support family growth than they were in the past: 16
percent provide adoption assistance, up from 11 percent last year.
In addition, firms are pitching in to help with education: 8
percent assist with college/school selection and referral services,
and 20 percent offer scholarships for family members of
employees.

Businesses are also recognizing that more workers, especially
among the Boomer cohort, have to assume the care-taking
responsibilities for their aging parents. The number of companies
providing an eldercare referral service benefit increased from 15
percent to 19 percent over the past year. Some companies have also
begun to provide other services, including emergency eldercare (5
percent) and company-supported eldercare centers (2 percent).
Larger businesses are more likely to participate in such programs:
19 percent of companies with between 2,501 and 5,000 employees
offer emergency eldercare, compared with only 3 percent of
companies with less than 100 employees.

Benefit trends have also begun to reflect America's changing
family structures. More employers are offering benefits to domestic
partners: 25 percent of those surveyed currently provide benefits
to opposite sex live-ins, and 16 percent offer benefits to same-sex
partners. An additional 2 percent and 3 percent, respectively, plan
to offer such benefits to opposite and same-sex domestic partners
in the near future. This is the first year the survey broke out
domestic partners by relationship type, reflecting a growing
recognition of changing family situations: In 1997, only 6 percent
of businesses offered domestic partner benefits of any kind.

A few firms, despite the tight job market, are still bending
over backward to keep their work force happy. Four percent of
companies allow pets at work and one company even offers pet-care
referrals. Wonder if they'll cover Fifi's health care bills?

For more information, contact the SHRM Foundation at (800)
444-5006.

All in a Day's Work

Almost 40 percent of companies polled allow workers to
telecommute, compared with just 20 percent that did so five years
ago. The results are based on the responses of 700 human resources
managers.